Name: Milk or Pudding Diet
Ingredients: 12 oz. of bread; 2 pints of milk; 1 oz. of butter; 1 pint of beef tea (when ordered); gruel (as required); barley-water (as required)

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Milk or Pudding Diet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Soak the bread in 2 pints of milk until soft.
If desired, add rice, sago, or arrowroot to the milk and cook until thickened.
Stir in 1 oz. of butter until melted.

Serve

Serve with beef tea if instructed.
Prepare gruel and barley-water as needed.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Beef + barleytop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together458 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Tea + barleytop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together49 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,466 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).